770 KEPORT— 1887. 



not always easily found creatures that we can hope to obtain them. My persistency 

 in appealing to Mr. E, P. Ramsay has been lately rewarded by the arrival of P. 

 leuckai'ti, which has been found near Wide Bay, Queensland. 



15. A Note on the Helations of Helminth Parasites to Grouse Disease. 

 By Professor F. Jeffret Bell, M.A., Sec.R.M.8. 



The death of a large number of grouse in the south-west of Scotland — or, to 

 use less exact language, the prevalence of grouse disease in that region — has again 

 brought into prominence the relation of tapeworms to the disease. 



All those who have interested themselves in what has been written on the 

 subject during the past year will agree that, in the minds of many writers, sus- 

 picion is still attached to the Trenia which is so frequently found in the intestine 

 of the grouse ; many naturalists had come to the conclusion that the presence of 

 the tapeworm was in no sense the cause of the disease, whatever relation it might 

 have directly to the death of the bird ; but as this view is by no means so widely 

 known or accepted as it should be, and as no real progress in the investigation can 

 be made till disturbing elements are withdrawn, I may here summarise the evi- 

 dence in favour of the benign, or at least non-malign, character of the tapeworm's 

 presence, which I have lately obtained. 



1. Of two grouse examined last October the better nourished had the larger 

 number of tapeworms. 



2. A grouse killed on August 12 this year had a perforation of the small 

 intestine about 200 mm. beyond the end of the duodenal loop ; all but one of the 

 tapeworms, which were numerous in this bird, were found in the rectum ; only one 

 was found in the neighbourhood of the perforation, though that part of the gut is 

 commonly and the other very rarely infested. 



3. A grouse kUled on August 15 this year was found to have sporadic patches 

 of inflammation in the walls of the intestine and cseca ; from 370 mm. of the 

 intestine no less than twenty-four tapeworms were taken, but for the whole of this 

 tract there was not the least trace of inflammation. 



I may pass from these facts, which are quite sufficient to dispose of any theory 

 as to the possibility of ' the secretion of the worms themselves ' poisoning the 

 blood, or indeed of any similar speculation, to note the relation between the ' disease ' 

 and the worm, which the weight of the late Dr. Cobbold's opinion has led many 

 to regard as the cause of the disease. I only found the Strongylus jierflracilis of 

 Cobbold in one of three sets of birds examined between last autumn and this 

 spring ; in the thud set, which consisted of a single bird from Sir W. Wallace's 

 moor near Stranraer, the nematode was abundant ; in the grouse killed on August 

 12 the worm was again abundant, but it appeared to be much less numerously 

 represented in the one killed on the 15th. I think it should be borne in mind that 

 the two latter birds were likewise from Sir W. Wallace's moor. 



As the worm was absent from two sets out of five, and the three in which it 

 was found all came from the same moor, it is quite impossible to point to Strongylus 

 pergracilis as the cause of the disease. 



The facts thus briefly set forth sufficiently dispo.se of the suspicion that hel- 

 minth parasites are the cause of what is called grouse disease. The pathology of 

 the afl'ection or aflections is beyond my province, and I have only to point out that 

 the elimination of helminth parasites makes the class of observations already begun 

 by Dr. Klein more necessary and lu-geut. 



16. The Distribution of the Nightingale in Yorlcshire. By J. Lister. 



17. Report of the Comviitlee on Provincial Museums. — See Reports, p. 97. 



18. On the Mug a Silhworm and Moth (Anthersea Assama) of Assam, and 

 other Indian silk-producing species. By Thomas Wakdle. 



